Revamping the Future of News: How Particle is Innovating with AI
As traffic declines and newsrooms face layoffs, publishers are increasingly concerned about the impact of AI technologies on their revenue streams. In this landscape, news-reader startup Particle is emerging as a key player, partnering with publishers to explore new business models that harness AI without sacrificing financial stability. Founded by former Twitter engineers, Particle offers a news-reading app designed to provide readers with comprehensive insights by leveraging AI to summarize news from a variety of sources.
Particle has recently brought its first publishing partners on board to shape its future direction.
On Monday, the company announced a collaboration with Reuters, where it has begun subscribing to the Reuters newswire to deliver timely information on current events. Additionally, Particle secured $10.9 million in Series A funding, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, with participation from Axel Springer, a global media powerhouse known for brands like Business Insider, Politico, Welt, and Bild.
These strategic partnerships and investments highlight Particle’s commitment to collaborating with publishers to achieve common goals, rather than merely addressing their challenges.
While a focus on publisher needs can be promising, success is not guaranteed. For instance, this year saw the shutdown of Post News, a Twitter alternative backed by a16z, which tried to implement a micropayment model for reading articles. Similarly, Artifact—an app developed by Instagram’s co-founders—was acquired by Yahoo after struggling to utilize AI effectively for personalizing news experiences.
Despite these setbacks, Particle believes it can provide substantial value to news consumers beyond mere AI summaries. The startup aims to present a more holistic understanding of the news by examining various perspectives on each story through the power of AI.
“Part of Particle’s mission is to analyze how stories are reported from diverse viewpoints," explained co-founder Sara Beykpour, who previously served as a senior director of product management at Twitter. “We believe this is essential.”
Beykpour has an impressive background, having worked on notable products such as Twitter Blue and Twitter Video, while her co-founder, Marcel Molina, is a former senior engineer at Twitter and Tesla.
Founded in February 2023, Particle initially aimed for a more social approach given the founders’ backgrounds. However, within months, they pivoted towards a sharper focus on news and information. Beykpour shared, “We wanted to create an experience that cuts through the noise, enabling users to grasp current events faster and in a way that benefits both readers and content creators.”
Leveraging AI for a personalized news experience, Particle takes a different route to mitigate the issue of “filter bubbles,” where users only encounter information aligning with their views. Instead of presenting individual articles, Particle underscores the entire story as seen by multiple outlets, providing readers with a multi-faceted perspective and easy access to various sources. This approach also reduces redundancy, ensuring readers do not encounter similar stories repeatedly.
Using advanced AI technologies, including GPT-4, Particle summarizes news efficiently. Currently, the app selects its sources from a diverse array of publishers without allowing user-generated inputs for sources. This could evolve, but the aim is to maintain exposure to multiple viewpoints.
Several companies have attempted to address similar issues in the past. A few years ago, Google engineers created an app called Brief to combat information overload, relying on human editors for news summaries before the team was acquired by Twitter. Meanwhile, SmartNews integrated features for showcasing articles across the political spectrum, although that approach has not been a major driver of user adoption.
Particle has yet to finalize its business model, emphasizing the need for collaboration with publishers to shape this vital component. “We intend to partner with publishers to develop a sustainable model. All options, including revenue sharing and advertising, are on the table,” Beykpour noted.
With funding from its Series A round, Particle is expanding its leadership team, adding Lightspeed’s Michael Mignano to its board. It has also enlisted a group of angel investors, including notable figures like Jason Goldman and Vijaya Gadde.
Before its Series A, Particle raised $4.4 million in seed funding in April 2023 from Kindred Ventures, Adverb Ventures, and several angel investors, including Ev Williams and Scott Belsky. Additionally, industry veterans David Brinker and Tony Haile serve as official advisers to the company.
Armed with this funding, Particle is hiring for key roles, including back-end engineers, community leads, and media partnership leads. The app is currently in private beta testing with select users via iOS’s TestFlight, with plans to expand to web and Android platforms in the future.
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